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York's Dr Alison Wallace has new book published

Posted on 15 May 2018

A Research Fellow from the University of York has had her book, Ownership, Narrative, Things, published.

Dr Alison Wallace, who is a Research Fellow for the Centre for Housing Policy in the Department of Social Policy and Social Work at the University of York, has recently had her work published. The book, that is independent from stakeholders in the industry, is an academic study of shared ownership schemes in the UK. 

Ownership, Narrative, Things, sets out to challenge everyday assumptions held about the ‘social’ and the ‘legal’ in property and uses a case study of a low-cost home ownership initiative at the margins of renting and owning provided by social landlords, known as shared ownership. Dr Allison Wallace co-authored the book with Professor Dave Cowan of the University of Bristol and Professor Helen Carr of the University of Kent, which provides a study of the construction of property ownership, from the creation of this idea through to the present day, and offer consideration of key issues surrounding property, ownership, and the social.

Dr Wallace added, 'The book is based on the Leverhulme Trust funded research on 'Crisis Moments - Shared ownership'.

The authors explain the significance of the things (from the formal documents like leases, to odd materials like sweet wrappers and cigarette butts) commonly found in the narratives around shared ownership which are used to construct it as private ownership in everyday life. The book reveals how the dream of ownership can become tarnished when people’s identities as ‘owners’ come under threat. 

Find out more and buy the book, Wallace, A., Cowan, D., Carr, H., (2018) Ownership, Narrative, Things Palgrave Macmillan UK. 

See the courses available in the Department of Social Policy and Social Work at the University of York.